read you like the myth-lines on my palm
by sybilius
Summary: A portrait in motion of Mihael, Mello modulating through his own uncanny ability to understand people, and the way his talent touches, triggers the stories that move around and with him. Loosely after the prompt: 'Five times Mello believes he has met L, and one time he is certain.' Originally posted on Ao3.


**read you like the myth-lines on my palm**

 **i. 1999**

Mihael Keehl comes from a crime scene, his ten-year old eyes crystalline and calculative. They reflect psychosis, suffocation, a mother driven mad by years of poverty. The corpse of a father who lost the will to fight back. They read compulsively.

Mihael regards the tall, distinguished gentleman with interest, discerning symbologies in the lines of his face. _Eager. Tinkerer, creative, he's seeing a tool._ The man's gaze glances back from the conversation with the orphanage owner. It softens as it falls on Mihael. _He's seeing a boy._

"You're prone to staring." Mihael flinches back as he notices the figure standing beside him. Tall, but hunched over, dressed in a plain white shirt and dark blue jeans. His eyes are fathomless, which should unnerve Mihael, but it only makes him curious. He's a teenager, but the black shadows under his eyes remind Mihael of his mother. _Assessing, he's looking for something_. Mihael simply stares, waits for the teenager's face to tell him what he wants to know.

"What's your name?" the face remains only surface. Mihael is surprised, but still says nothing. The teenager hunches on the ground in a peculiar squat, taking his hands to his knees.

Mihael finds his words, something he doesn't have to do often, "What are you expecting from me?"

The teenager's dark eyes make a complicated expression. _RegretExcitementRecognitionResignment?_ His bare toes shuffle over each other.

"I suppose, Mello, something like that. Or perhaps I was hoping you wouldn't be as perceptive as Wammy suggested." _Regret, definitely._

"That isn't my name." the flavor of defiance is on his tongue, and it's always been his favorite flavor.

"It could be."

Mihael considers this, turning his thoughts to himself as he seldom does. This seems to please the teenager, who gives him the smallest of smiles. _Mello. Mello._ Mihael looks back at him, but his name doesn't show on his face. Very little does, which is unusual.

"Your name could be Crow," Mihael tries very hard to read the story written under birdlike eyes.

"Hm. Crow, Poe. B calls me Montresor sometimes," _Absent-minded, possibilities flash under his eyes_. This man carries a lot of stories. _Which of them are true?_

"That's not your name."

"No, it couldn't be. It comes from a story," Crow takes out a bar of chocolate, unwraps it and nibbles experimentally, before making a grimace. Mihael watches him hungrily. Crow regards him, then offers him the bar, which he gnaws at with fascination. It tastes like _decisiveness_ and he likes the way it smooths over him.

"Crow suits you better."

"Mello suits you. You like it. And don't think I can't see it on your face," Crow smirks, _I know what you're thinking_ , his eyes speak plainly for the first time, "You're not the only one who's good at this. Though you are good."

Mihael breaks into a smile as the thought sparks through him, unable to hold back his pride. He suddenly wants very much for this strange creature to stay. "Tell me the story, Crow."

"Fine." Crow closes his eyes and spins him a story of revenge and murder. When it finishes, the man's eyes are bitter, which goes with the chocolate.

"Of course, Mello, if you murder someone, you're always brought to justice, unlike Montresor."

"Justice?" Mihael is confused for the first time in the presence of this strange creature who puts him at ease. Crow stares at his confusion, and _yes, that is certainly sadness. Then conviction_.

"When evil is punished. Imprisonment. Execution," Crow puts a thumb to his lips, and smiles, indiscernible, "The good guys always win."

Mihael doesn't understand what this means, but soon, soon it's all he thinks about.

 **ii. 2000**

Wammy's house suits him like the gold in his hair. He learns with a passion, learns to use his face to get what he wants from others since they read like an open book. He reads a lot of those too, and memorizes entire books. If Crow ever returns, he wants to have a story to tell.

He soars amidst the other children, easily outstripping them in every regard. He picks up a friend, a skinny red-head who teaches him the ins and outs and the secret passages in the Wammy House, shows him where to nick violent movies and re-wires a game of Pong so that they can play Pac-Man instead. Mello teaches him subtlety, which Matt turns into pranks. Mad Matt and Matchstick Mello gain respect among the children—as well as notoriety.

Once, after Mello scorches the chemistry lab with an experiment that Wammy would later turn into a weapon, Matt takes Mello to the river to tell him a detective story.

"His name is L? That's not a real name," Mello glares at Matt, searching for the lie in his eyes that so often sparkle of sarcasm. Matt's face is completely lit up, _inspired, and a little exasperated. He's trying to impress me, why?_

"Of course not, dummy, it's a fake name. No one's ever met him. That's how he stays safe," Matt hesitates for a moment, saying _You're important_ , with the the curve of his mouth, "Matt isn't my real name either. It's Mail."

"You shouldn't really tell me these things, Matt," Mello catches a flicker of something softer in the way Matt's jaw shifts when he looks at him. And he can't put a name to the way Matt looks, but it softens something in him as well. He's never seen that look before.

"Hey, it's you and me, Mell. I'd trust you with anything."

Mello bumps his head playfully against Matt's shoulder, shy and serious in turn. "My name used to be Mihael. But I'm Mello now, Matt."

"I know."

Whispers of the mononym L start to bubble through their games of pranking and wit in the house. L is the epitome of the storybook-hero. A great detective. Mello finishes reading Sherlock Holmes and promptly tells Roger that he wants to be L when he finishes school. Roger blanches, letting _worry that it will be too dangerous and hurt the boy_ film up on his eyelids. But he laughs, which says _I really don't think you do_ , and oh yes. Mello does.

"Why don't you talk to Adeline, when she comes back, boy. She'll be able to tell you a thing or two about detective work." That's _condescension_ that turns up Roger's mouth, and Mello storms out in a huff. The children may take him seriously, but something about that teen-porcelain-doll princess holds everyone in thrall. Including Mello, which is a bitter enough thought that he convinces Matt to pinch him a bar of chocolate.

Sometimes they say she talks to L. Some whisper that she _is_ L, but Mello feels deeply that this is wrong.

Crow does come back, leading a small boy by the hand into the foyer of the Wammy House. He must be a year younger than Mello, his hair soft white, ethereal. _He's beautiful_. The moment Mello moves forward, both Crow and the boy turn grey eyes on him. Their faces are _tabula rasa_ , but Crow's is practiced. The boy's perfect blankness is honest. Mello is suddenly terrified of him.

"Near, this is Mello," Crow speaks gently to the boy with the white hair. Near clutches a small toy robot, but says nothing. "You might have to give Near a moment. He's still recovering from a virus destroying everything he holds dear, jet lag, and the thrill of the chase."

"What?"

"I brought you a problem to solve, if you're interested," Crow gives him a curious smile, hands Mello a chocolate bar wrapper with the problem written on the inside, and sits Near down on the floor. Near clings to his leg. Mello tries to get a read off of him, looks him in the eye, and the boy smirks back. Or perhaps he's trying to smile, but Mello glares defensively in any case.

"Hmm—Mello, tell Roger that we require a slice of cherry cake, and my copy of Grimm's Fairy tales." Mello flinches, but obeys. There's something about the even way in which Crow measures up Mello and Near that makes Mello consider the myth behind the mononym. And whether or not there is a man behind the myth.

But there is a myth for this man, Crow drawls out the tale "The Story of a Boy who went Forth to Learn Fear", and Mello sits cross-legged to listen to him speak, but starts sketching out the problem in chalk on the hard-wood floor. It's a tricky one, and Crow's story is far more engrossing.

Crow pauses in the tale, _is that pity in his gaze?_ "This story could be about you, Near." And Near, his pale lips pressed pretty and mute, says nothing. The story ends. The boy learns nothing. And Mello is left with a half-solved Diophantine equation and a thousand questions.

The first thing Near says solves the problem, which causes Crow to smile, saying _I'm proud of how useful you could be_. It's also the first time Mello feels hatred, but not the last.

He never hates his mother. He is grateful.

 **iii. 2001**

Competition with Near makes him irrational, and he festers in it. Anger, excitement, _Icanwinthistime_ , every time, but Near is almost always faster, cleverer, eidetic memory and twirling hair to unravel schemes. The word _Successor_ finds its way into their vocabulary, with success being the key word.

The two of them pinch stories, storm Adeline when she comes to visit, Mello with his brash but charming posturing, and Near with an oh-so-innocent request to play a game. Mello convinces Matt to bug Roger's office, which is how they learn about the mysterious B. B who watches L's back, who's out there on the front lines, who drags up the data and takes bullets for breakfast and has an uncanny knowledge of names.

"B for Backup, B for Buddy, punk," Matt grins through a cigarette, "I'll _be_ the B to your L."

Matt gets this look in his eyes sometimes that says _I want something from you_ , or perhaps _I want to keep you safe_. It makes Mello want to _kiss_ him, which is all kinds of strange and _wrong_ and perfect. He tries to ignore it.

"Whatever you say, Matt."

Though he would never admit it, secretly, Mello _craves_ the kind of detective B is, having recently read through all the volumes of James Bond in less than a week. He rationalizes that if A blends her fieldwork with her deductions, he could too.

Which makes it all the worse when Near states over a line of dominos, "I think you should take the Field specialization, Mello."

"You're in denial, freak," Mello's taunts are rarely this clumsy. Except when it comes to _perfect Near_ , "You won't believe it when I beat you, and I'm chosen."

"You're already beating me at marksmanship, mimicry and adaptive combat," Near drawls, fidgeting with his fingertips.

"Don't fucking patronize me, Near. I'm not going to be second to anyone, least of all you."

"I don't think B is second to anyone." and the way Near says it, so _innocent_ and honest flares Mello up. He kicks the dominos over spitefully, hating himself as he storms out, hating what a _child_ Near is, what a _child_ Near makes him. He kicks the wall and swears loudly at the pain.

"Tch, temper, temper, little one." The familiar drawl of a voice at the end of the hall has a bit of a lilt to it this time, making it taste…different.

"Crow?" the dark-haired figure slumped in the bottle-blue jeans causes him to straighten. When the man turns to face him, his bone-structure is slightly off and his eyes are red-cast. The resemblance to Crow is otherwise uncanny.

"Oh, no, Mihael. You can call me Ryuzaki."

"That's not my name."

"Lied the doctor to the devil, lied the Master to Margarita" the man's grin causes Mello to back up several steps, _he's thinking of murder. But that's not possible_. Or was it?

"No need to _backup_ , my dear, not unless you're me." Ryuzaki's eyes flicker over Mello's forehead, "Your number's not up just yet."

 _What can he possibly read from my forehead?_ Mello had never found the forehead to be particularly revealing of intentions, but he didn't know everything. The man hunkers down to the floor, puts a finger to his lips. It's almost farsical, the imitation of Crow in every aspect. But there's an exaggerated danger, a larger-than-life brilliance in his eyes. _Could Crow be imitating this man?_ Mello catches a movement of white hair at the edge of the hallways and clenches his fists. Ryuzaki laughs, exposing his taut white neck.

"As much as I would _love_ to get involved with your little cat-and-mouse game, I have one of my own to play. And one perfect puppy to pay my respects to." Ryuzaki grins and pats Mello on the head, "Do you know where sweet _Adeline_ is? She and I have a bit of a _date_."

"I don't know—I heard she came back a few days ago, but I haven't seen her." Not for lack of trying, though. He hesitates, "Her room is at the end of the hall."

Ryuzaki smiles, _with the wisdom of Wammy and the calculation of…Crow? Who is this man?_ "Thank you, Mihael. Let me give you a bit of advice. You might think games are only fun if you win. But have you ever asked yourself why you play?"

"What are you talking about?"

"Oh come on, Mihael, don't play dumb with me. I heard you were much, much better than that. The detective game. The Letter game. What's your stake in it?"

"Justice."

"Oh pretty-parrot, do you even know what that means to you?"

Mello glares, and opens his mouth to retort, but nothing comes out that doesn't sound storybook and trite. Ryuzaki's eyes soften a moment, _it's all right. I try too._ He nods once, then moves away. Mello hangs back, worried that this shadow-of-crow really does crave the killing in his eyes. Ryuzaki, whoever he is, doesn't seem to mind, crawls hands-and-knees to the end of the hall as if Mello had ceased to exist. He knocks sharply.

"Allie-sweet. I brought you a gift!"

She opens the door a very small amount, "Is that you?" Mello takes this opportunity to slip into a closet, open slightly to watch the scene unfold.

"Call me Ryuzaki today." the man winks, and the door is open such that he can see Adeline. She is pale and drawn, but she gazes at Ryuzaki as if _he might be the answer_ , "Two things darling. First, I brought you a rose. To say I'm sorry, you're sorry, we're all sorry. Second… well here's for your heart, kiddo."

Before she can take the rose in his pale, outstretched hand, he yanks her down to her knees, pressing the rose thorns against her face and crashing his lips to hers. Mello gapes for a moment at how _brutal_ that move is, juxtaposed against the tender way Ryuazki captures her soft red lips. She bends into it, breathes out small and relieved.

"You taste like strawberries." Her voice accuses. The two have a dialogue with their eyes too quick for Mello to understand in the dim lighting.

In a fluid motion, Ryuzaki forces her against the door frame, gnaws at her neck, "Oh, did you want it like him, honey? Hoping that it's sweeter than his bloody _cake_?"

She shoves him back with a kick to the gut, "I'm nothing like him."

Ryuzaki wheezes out a laugh, "And that, Alice, is the problem you pretend you don't have." Adeline's stricken expression is barely a flicker before she settles back to her pretty, angry pout. It's flawless. _I had no idea it was such a deep mask. No wonder she's shadowing L_. The admission is grudging, but Mello is nothing if not honest with himself.

"Oh god," she wipes her mouth and spits, "I don't know how he does it."

"Just so you know, I've decided I'd rather not know."

"What do you mean?"

"Oh, but you're usually so good at my riddles, my lovely little Liddell."

"You're kidding." she gapes at him, "You're leaving?"

"Bigger, better, brighter, baby."

"Take me with you." Her face crumples, shatters like Mello has _never_ seen before. _That's desperation, and resignation, and she doesn't even know where it comes from._ Mello suddenly wants very much to hold Adeline, six years his senior, hold her hand until that look falls off her face. Ryuzaki runs the rose over her face, now slightly scratched.

"Alice, darling. I can't follow you down the rabbit-hole you're going, trust me. And you certainly don't want to go down mine."

"Please, Beyond." her eyes really do _beg_ then. And Ryuzaki, with his red-eyes and riddles, stands and kisses her once on the forehead, once just above the forehead.

"Don't think about me later, Alice. Think about roses." Then he walks a slow walk out the door, out the street without a word. Adeline watches every step, then retreats to her room. Mello hesitates, once, twice, to knock on her door, but thinks better of it.

Four hours later, New Year's eve, porcelain-doll Adeline is dragged dripping out of the bathtub. Roger ushers Mello's stare away, but not before he catches the 'L' crossed out over and again on her bloody wrist.

It is that day that Mello swears, justice or none, to use his eyes to stop pain where it exists.

 **iv. 2002**

The funeral wrecks Mello. He's a sandcastle cascade by the end, holding together just barely by the tilt of his neck. Her face is so quiet in death. All things are quiet in death.

That evening, Matt shuffles into his room, sits down on his bed, and puts an arm around him. Mello gives in to it then, kisses him all clumsy and teeth and barely teenage desperation. Matt kisses back, and then Mello _sobs_ , just cries while Matt holds his shoulders, his dripping eyes not knowing what to say.

"It's okay, Mell. Shh."

"It's not okay Matt, it's not, it's not, it's not."

"Shhh, Mell. You didn't do anything wrong."

It's a long time before Mello believes him.

Matt is the greatest kindness that Wammy's grants to Mello, and though the desire to be _right,_ to _win_ , runs deep, the kindness roots just a bit deeper. It's almost enough to make him knock on Near's door when he hears the small whimpers that night. But there are limits, and there are lines, and some of them Mello doesn't cross.

A day after the funeral Near stares directly at Mello through a wall made of wooden blocks.

"It looks like we're the successors to L now."

Mello hates that Near can put to words what he only knows by feel. But he bites back angry and says "What about B?"

"He left. Do keep up, Mello. As I recall, you were there."

The missing piece of the puzzle slides into place. _Ofcourse_ , Ryuzaki was B, _ofcourse_ freakish Near would know that before he did. In retaliation, he throws himself into his studies, determined to be faster, stronger, better, _for once and for always._

A week later Matt is trying to coax him to try out a new game he's designed, but Mello is knee-deep in advanced studies of the Italian Mafia, and not even Matt can convince him to let up on Near for even a moment. Matt arranges himself on the couch in exasperation, the pinging sound of digital destruction barely registering against the pages of espionage.

"Hey, I haven't seen you around." Matt's voice floats over Mello's focus.

"No, I suppose I'm here to pay my respects. And I'm looking for a friend. What's this you're playing?" The other voice is familiar in its deepness, but unfamiliar in the way it's carefully cadenced, disguised.

"Check it out, stranger, one of the next wonders of the world. It's a game that combines robots, with unicorns, with _explosions_ and rainbows."

A bell-like laugh of relief cuts through the air, "How terribly…cute."

"You making fun of me?"

"Not at all, Matt, not at all."

"Hey, you're pretty good at the game, where'd you get those fingers from?" the barest chuckle.

A few minutes, hours go by, Mello flipping pages one by one, considering how best to stage an assassination, how best to conceal an assassination. Matt remains silent. Then, he hears the shift of footsteps.

"It's good. I recommend you ask Wammy about Q. He could use someone like you. Also, this game needs theme music." A hesitation, "Thanks for the distraction."

A half a moment later, Mello hears a sharp gasp and Matt is gesturing wildly beside him, "My god Mells, that guy's skill was unreal. He's better than me, and I fucking designed this game!"

Mello does allow himself a slight smile at Matt's goggle-eyed excitement, and closes his book for the moment, sneaks a squeeze at Matt's hand under the table, "No way, Matt. No one can beat you, not when it comes to tech."

"See for yourself!"

"Well, who was he?"

"Mm—older guy. Not like, Wammy, maybe twenty-some odd? Dark hair, big eyes?"

 _Crow._ Mello swears internally, but there's nothing for it "Yeah, I know the guy. I'm glad you met him. He's nice. A little odd."

Mello turns back to his book. A year ago, a month ago, he would have ran after Crow, but things are different now. No use chasing ghosts when real ghosts are cropping up, and he could be hearing his own call to adventure any day now.

True to form, Near and Mello are requested to an audience with a letter on a computer screen exactly one month later.

 **v. 2003**

The night before another set of case files, another challenge, again against Near, Mello can't sleep. Rumors of a cataclysmic case have wormed their way into the collective consciousness, and Mello is left pacing and wondering why he wasn't involved, if _Near_ was involved. Even though he's almost positive that Near was not, never mind Matt's surveillance.

Past midnight, Mello's oversensitive ears catch the sound of movement below. Carefully, carefully, he slips out of his bedroom. Past sleeping Matt, sleeping _Near_ , to the basement. When he reaches the bottom of the stair, he can hear raised voices at a familiar bored pitch. _Crow? Ryuzaki?_

A pair of handcuffs lie torn apart on the floor, and two Crows grapple against the stone walls of the basement. At first Mello thinks they are fighting, but as he gets closer he's not sure. Then the red-eyed Ryuzaki turns his face, and Mello has to stifle a gasp of horror.

Ryuzaki's face is destroyed, a half-mess of barely healing burn scars. He is a monstrosity of his former self, or perhaps, he looks more like himself than he ever had wearing Crow's face.

"Just once, Lawli," the second Crow bites at the first's earlobe, who gasps into it, blood on his neck. Ryuzaki pulls back, red eyed and terrifying _murder-intent,_ "let me have you just once."

"I should kill you." Crow spits at him, but doesn't pull back, as if reveling in the danger.

"I don't think my number's up quite yet," Ryuzaki laughs in a manner so rehearsed in its marrow-chilling that Mello barely takes it seriously. "but I'd really like your number, pretty please call me baby."

Crow shoves him across the room, brutal but clumsy capoeira, "Can you give me a straight answer for once in your goddamn life? Tell me _why._ "

"Let me give you a hint. B is for break. A is for Avenge. L is for love you every day, always on my mind,"

Crow's face contorts, _guilthorroraccusationfear._ He shoves Ryuzaki, _B_ against the wall tugs his arm into a hold.

"What the hell did you say to her? I know you were there before she died. What did you say?"

"I said I was sorry, darling, and that I was leaving," B watches Crow's eyes shuffle _disbelief and anger and desperation,_ "I wish I could say I had killed her—but oh no Lawli, you did that, then she did. You know, I might have deserved you, my dance partner, but Allie certainly didn't."

 _Anguish_ is what flickers briefly over Crow's features, replaced by layers and layers of rationality, carefulness, victory. He and B tear at each other's throats with their eyes, _both of them with murder in their gaze_. Mello hadn't realized that Crow was someone to fear. He wants to move, but he is paralyzed.

At that moment, Wammy's tall figure shadows them from the end of the hall. Quicker than Mello would have believed, the old man takes hold of B, manhandles him back into handcuffs.

"What needs to be done?" Wammy's eyes are sad, but all practicalism.

"Lock him up until my order," Crow states, not looking at Wammy. B is led away, grinning from his ruined cheekbones. From where he is, Mello can see Crow's leaden face. It slides into place. _Crow is L_.

 _Crow is L._ Mello's heartbeat picks up, but he feels surprisingly calm, calm and mundane in a moment he's imagined several hundred times over. He will point out his deduction and L will immediately recognize him, for his brilliance unparalleled, invite him to shadow him as the next B, and then?

Crow turns his face sideways, _he has the pain of betrayal, of a thousand stories, a thousand faces and all of them tragedies. Subsisting on tragedy as victory as justice as everything._

Mello can't ask anything of him. Not if he wants to make good on his promise.

"Don't kill him." Mello steps out on instinct, resonates with what he knows needs to be heard.

Crow-who-is-L turns back, stares in disbelief at Mello. Matchstick Mello, with his angry words and firefly hair. Mello who sees how he roils to protest but stares him straight back down. Mello watches him try to logic out an escape route for the pain underneath the anger underneath the righteousness, "I should have him executed. It's what he deserves."

"But is it what you deserve?" Again, questions on instinct, and Mello knits his brow at the way Crow's face twists. It hurts Crow, but not in a bad way. In a raw way.

"You don't understand. He's a murderer. There are rules, there is justice, there are things we have to stand for," Crow's eyes almost burn blue-black, "And I hate him. I always have."

"You need him," Mello can read it as plainly as the black in his hair, "Lock him up, kill him to the world, never speak to him again if you have to. But don't execute him."

Crow's voice catches in his throat. His eyes have the look of one who has forgotten the catharsis of tears, "You really do see too much, Mello."

He walks out the hallway slowly, and Mello knows to let him go. With the wisdom of his barely-fourteen years, he knows that even heroes are human.

 **vi. 2004**

Everyone at Wammy's has heard of the Kira-murders, about L's bold decision to _show himself_. Show himself to the world. Near builds puzzles with the mononym in the corner, blank white, and whispers that L is losing this fight. That he lost the moment the death toll hit the thousands.

Mello spits angry in Near's face, but the case just washes him with blue, rather than fire.

He kisses Matt by the river, long and slow one day, and Matt stops for a moment and asks.

"Mell, what if you didn't hate Near?"

Mello is so shocked by the unusual thoughtfulness in Matt's gaze that he laughs, then throws a rock in the stream. "If I didn't hate him." It sounds unreasonable under his lips.

"He doesn't hate you."

"Now how the fuck would you know that," Mello fires up at the suggestion that _anyone_ could read Near at all, anything from that terrifyingly white face.

"He told me."

"I didn't realize you two talked." Mello glares coldly, shoving off Matt's arm.

"Oh, come off it, Melo-drama-queen. He talks to me. Or talks at me, when I'm playing or coding. I don't talk to him back. I just, you know, got to wondering."

"It's a stupid thing to wonder about." Mello states petulantly, and sees the way _disappointment_ and _well, sorry I asked_ , flicker across Matt's face before he reaches for Mello's hand again.

"Yeah, it really was."

"Do you ever think about getting out of here, Matt?"

"What, you mean leave? Like B did?"

 _Not like him_ , Mello thinks, "It's a stupid thought too, really. I couldn't leave being L to Near. It has to be me."

"No," Matt sighs, and Mello doesn't look at his face to read what's written there, "I don't think you could."

An early sunrise takes Mello to Adeline's grave, though he doesn't know why. But when he sees the hunched figure with a finger to his lips already waiting, he knows. Mello knows by now to trust his instincts. He stands next to Crow. They stare at the gravestone for a moment. Not speaking.

 _Begin at the beginning, and go on till you come to the end: then stop._

The grave inscription seems less strange a year later. Perhaps because Mello himself has found himself growing stranger. It is with that thought that he resolves to speak.

"You're L." Crow doesn't deny, he just stares, lets his eyes say, _yes Mello, haven't you always known?_ They resume staring at the grave. After a moment, Crow hunkers to the ground and sits, cross-legged, patting the ground next to him with the bitterest trace of a smile. Mello sits, lets the morning dew sink into his legs.

"B is dead." L states.

"Tell me that story, Crow."

L breathes in _as if it costs him everything_ , Mello worries, and then begins speaking as if it means nothing. He tells it like a newspaper report, like a police report. It's thrilling to hear the man on the other side of the letter speak, listen to him gain strength at his own words. Mello is a rapt audience, gasping and eyes shining. Everything a good storyteller needs. He commits every word to memory, resolves to retell it as many times as it can be told.

The story ends, or perhaps begins anew, with an execution from an unknown, godlike hand. The way L talks about Kira is a mix of _greedfascinationexcitement_. Similar, Mello realizes, to the way he looked at B, but without the disgust in the reflection.

"Can I help you with the case?" Mello begs. L smiles back soft.

"To be honest, Mello? I don't want to risk you. You're too good for that. It's too soon, and Kira is far too dangerous."

"I can do it, I swear. I'm the best at fieldwork, disguise, self-defense— "

"No, Mello." And his eyes say _you remind me too much of someone too soon dead_ , so Mello looks away. The grave almost smiles in the now-high sun. Crow, L turns back to him and smiles real.

"I'll make you a promise. I will catch Kira. And then, he will be executed."

Mello takes that, a promise at a grave, pins it to his chest, and clutches at it whenever his conviction wavers. There are rules. There are costs. And there is justice. That's what he will stand for.


End file.
